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Scan 136
The Hawley Collection of violins, 1904
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 72. See the scan on archive.org.
1a custom of traveling from place to place to dispose of his stock on hand. The quality of his work varies largely, as it was governed, no doubt, by the remuneration he received. Those instruments intended for important personages were far more carefully constructed than those intended for the masses. His best work, as before stated, appeared between 1650 and 1670. The model of these instruments is strikingly like that of Nicola Amati's earlier work, and more particularly that of the Brothers Amati. The workmanship is so marvelously fine as to be excelled only by the best efforts of those past-masters, Stradivari and Nicola Amati. Nothing could be more artistic and graceful than the manner in which Stainer at this period finished his instruments. Sound hole, scroll, edge, corner, and arching are wrought with consummate skill. The varnish is of a soft mellow texture, its color varying slightly from a russet brown to about the shade of a ripe russet apple. The dry looking pale yellow varnish he did not use until later years and then only on his cheap instruments. His backs of this period in many cases are of one piece of maple, with rather an indistinct figure extending across its breadth, and interspersed, sometimes thickly and at others scantily, with small knotty spots called bird's eyes. The bellies are of the finest description, usually of a medium fine, very straight grain, the sides selected from the choicest wood. His sound holes are beautifully cut, though they have the appearance of being flattened at the top and bottom, yet in some violins, as in the Hawley Stainer, he happily almost escaped this error. The fashioning of the scroll and the small boss and the irregular turn of the volute, show that he could not wholly escape heredity—he was born a German. Some of Stainer's violins instead of the scroll bear a beautifully carved lion's head.
3In 1669 the clouds of misfortune overtook Jacob Stainer and they followed him to the grave. He was a devout Lutheran and saw no reason to hide his religious views under a bushel. In the age in which he lived this was an unpardonable crime. Compromising papers being found in his possession, he was arrested, and together with fellow-religionists, was thrown into prison. So although in the same year he was appointed violin-maker to Emperor Leopold I., he was not in a position then or afterwards to make use of the distinction. Three years later, having regained his liberty, he was forced by penury to peddle his instruments at the fairs and feasts of neighboring cities. In Salzburg, in 1675, it is recorded that he disposed of his violins at a sum equivalent to eight dollars and eighty-five cents. His path from this time until his death was indeed a stormy one. Naturally a poor manager, practically all his life he had been besieged by creditors. Now, in his old age, we find him in the grasp of money lenders, borrowing from one to pay the other. He was driven insane by misfortune. Such is the dismal picture presented by the latter years of the great German maker's life.
5Jacob Stainer did his last work in 1677. It was a kit of violins for the Monastery of St. Georgenburg. Much romance has been written about Stainer, including several novels, one of which, Dr. Schuler's, had considerable vogue at one time. A poem by the same author was dramatized by Theo. Rabenalt. The legend of the Twelve Elector Violins is well known, but there is not a particle of evidence to substantiate the romantic feature. That the twelve violins were made and that most of them still exist is not disputed, but there is nothing to show that
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